With only 9 games left in the season, Reading have fired manager Brian McDermott.
McDermott led the club to promotion last season, but after four successive Premier League defeats they are four points from safety and the club has panicked in firing the manager.
Reading released a statement that said:
“Owner Anton Zingarevich wishes to place on record his thanks to Brian.
“The search for a successor starts immediately. It is hoped a new manager will be in place as soon as possible.”
The question is why now? Reading struggled for the first half of this season, winning only two Premier League games. Against the odds McDermott was not fired then and Reading showed signs of improvement in January with four successive victories in all competitions as McDermott was named manager of the month.
However, defeats by Stoke, Wigan and Everton followed before a 2-1 loss at home to relegation rivals Aston Villa at the weekend left Reading 19th in the table, level on 23 points with bottom club QPR.
It’s the timing that makes no sense to me. Reading’s next two games are against Manchester United and Arsenal and Reading are not going to get anything from those games, regardless of who is in charge.
As many pundits suggested at the start of the season, Reading have really struggled this season and Reading owner Anton Zingarevich has to accept a lot of the blame for that. According to transfermarkt.co.uk, Reading had a net transfer spend of £8.7m in the two transfer windows. You cannot jump from the Championship to the Premier League and expect to survive by spending less than £9m to improve your squad.
SO who takes over from McDermott? Former Swindon manager Paolo Di Canio is the favorite to become Reading’s next manager according to bookmakers followed by Nigel Adkins and Nigel Gibbs.
If Di Canio does get the job, that will mean that there will be only 3 English managers managing in the Premier League; Harry Redknapp, Alan Pardew and Sam Allardyce.